


Discovery

by loup_garou



Category: Arrow (TV 2012), Batman - All Media Types
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-03
Updated: 2021-03-03
Packaged: 2021-03-16 16:54:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 983
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29828028
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/loup_garou/pseuds/loup_garou
Summary: Oliver gets injured, and insights
Comments: 6
Kudos: 41





	Discovery

Distantly, Oliver noted that the vehicle he was in was taking corners at a speed that should have been impossible. However, he was mostly focused on how much his leg hurt, especially when someone was leaning on it with all their weight. A mechanised voice growled at him, possibly saying “Don’t even think about fucking dying on me, Queen,” which was rather a strange thing to demand. He still did his best to cling to consciousness, and life, since the owner of the voice seemed to feel so strongly about it.

He hadn’t really intended to bleed at all today. He was going to drop by Gotham, see if the bats knew anything he didn’t about the new Head of the Demon, and leave as quickly as possible. The vigilante meet-up had interrupted Deathstroke, of all people, who did not take kindly to having a contract killing spoiled. Oliver had ended up with his leg sliced to ribbons before Slade had gone down under the combined attack of the bats. He blurrily watched Black Bat kick Deathstroke off the roof before blood loss made everything go very foggy indeed and his leg exploded with pain when Red Hood leaned on it full strength, yelling at Batman to call the car. He was wondering a little who in Gotham had put a contract out with Deathstroke, and then decided he could find out later, if there was a later.

The car screeched to a halt in a dark space, and he was unceremoniously dragged out of it. He was being carried, Nightwing holding his legs, someone else his upper body, and Red Hood’s hands still locked firmly around his leaking leg. There was a medbay, an elderly man in a mask, and a lot of pain and confusion. In the middle of it he gave up the fight against unconsciousness and let the world fade to black.

He woke up, a little unexpectedly. That had felt rather like death. He was still in the medbay, with an IV in and a blood bag emptying into him. Turning his head very gently to the side, he could see the next bed, on which a grumpy-looking Red Hood, without the helmet, was sitting having a bandage changed over a very long line of stitches. “Damnit, Replacement, that hurts!” he said with some annoyance. “Hold still and it won’t,” said the bat doing the changing, unperturbed.

A hand touched his other shoulder gently, and he turned his head, still very carefully since the room was spinning a bit, to see a masked blonde holding a cup with a straw for him. “Batgirl?” he tried to say, unsure how well it came out, and she stuck the straw in his mouth. The ice-cold water felt good in his dry throat. 

He looked around as best he could, and noted that everyone was there; Batman at a computer, Nightwing next to him, and the little Robin, for whatever reason, being carried over the shoulder of Black Bat, whining at her to put him down. That meant it was probably Red Robin patching up Hood. “What happened?” he asked nobody in particular, and Nightwing wandered over. “You took a sword to the leg, nicked your femoral artery,” he said cheerfully. “Agent A stitched you back up but you’ll be stuck here for a bit, until it heals enough that you can be moved.” 

‘Here’ was clearly a cave – a very large one, with chittering he eventually placed as the noises of bats. Nice to see how committed Batman was to his brand. And the idea that he grew little bat vigilantes like mushrooms underground had clearly been closer to the truth than Oliver was quite comfortable with. The cave seemed to lack certain comforts, despite the nice medbay – it was not particularly warm, especially not for someone who had lost a lot of blood recently. “Are you keeping me in this cave?” he asked, trying to sound incredulous and mostly sounding whiny. At that, Batman got up, too, and walked over. “We’re not taking you home, Queen,” he said. “Some of us are careful about our identities.” Well, that was rich, coming from someone who had used Oliver’s real name freely on a rooftop at their first encounter. “We will make sure you are comfortable, and Agent A will provide you with food and anything else you need. We have informed your team that you need to recuperate here for some days.” They had his team’s phone numbers, why was he even surprised?

“We will look after you, Queen,“ said Batman. “Black Bat, are you taking your brother anywhere in particular?” “No!” said Black Bat happily, executing a nice pirouette without dropping Robin. “We’re dancing!” Robin was at this point mostly holding on and fighting for his dignity. Batman picked him off Black Bat’s shoulder and slung him over his own, to a muffled “Father!” 

The elderly man, who Oliver assumed was the Agent A who had stitched him up, came into the medbay looking around at all of them. “A snack and then to bed, everyone,” he said. Batman opened his mouth, caught Agent A’s eye, and closed it again. Agent A gave him an approving nod. “There are some ham sandwiches for all of you. Robin, I have cheese and pickles for you.” Robin looked up from Batman’s shoulder, where he was still trying to look like he intended to be. “Thank you, Agent A,” he said. “That will be acceptable.”

Wait, what? Oliver felt his eyes widen. It was not possible that there was more than one kid that size in Gotham who spoke like that. He looked around at them – Nightwing, with the charming smile, the blonde Batgirl, the grumpy little Robin - and came to an unavoidable, and completely unbelievable, conclusion. He finally stared at Batman, seeing the resignation on his face. “Brucie?” he said, weakly.


End file.
